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Uplevel Your Business… and Your Whole Life

Discover how to get your business (and your mindset) out of overwhelm and into a system of clarity and abundance using the Uplevel blueprint of Strategy and Soul. It’s simpler than you might think. Strategies like upleveling your pricing models, nailing down your core message, and clean-selling – all the way to an easy (but profitable!) Sunday check-in habit. You can make much more money, take your weekends back, say good-bye to confusion, and…

The Single Biggest Cause of Failure

The Single Biggest Cause of Failure is part of my special summer Best of Series. These are the most popular posts on the Uplevel You blog, consisting of articles and videos you shouldn’t miss. Here’s a fav!

Chances are, there’s something you’re doing that will hold you back again and again in your life and your business. This is the biggest cause of failure. It isn’t about your marketing or the packages you’ve set up. This is all about YOU.

This has to do with what I call the SOUL and STRATEGY tracks of a business. The way I teach this in my Uplevel Academy Masterminds is that in your business there’s a STRATEGY TRACK– (this is the marketing, systems, and the real how-to and left brain work); and there’s a SOUL TRACK­– (the supposedly “soft” stuff, the mindset). These two go hand-in-hand because the strategy part will only get you so far…

You need to get to the SOUL work in order to get to the STRATEGY work.

On our journey to entrepreneurial success there’s a lot we carry with us and tend to hold on to– but really it’s about this: “What can we let go of?”

“Let go? No way,” you may be thinking. “I want MORE… more energy, more clients, more money!”

A ton of people think business success is about being more driven, having more, getting more, but this drive doesn’t serve them. Because the truth is that this process of Upleveling is really about letting go.

So, here’s what I know (from real-life personal experience) can help you to start letting go of the gunk that’s holding you back.

Start by catching yourself when you’re doing these things, and this is where true personal and business growth begin:

To succeed in your business let go of your need to be perfect before you take action. Be willing to do things imperfectly as an entrepreneur.

To succeed in your business let go of your fear of being seen- which can be anything from stating your opinion, owning your credibility, writing blog posts or articles, or reaching out to a client when it’s time for them to renew. You’re not a fraud, so stop thinking you are– you’re an entrepreneur. Own it.

To succeed in your business stop letting other people’s opinions define you. Take the time to ask yourself, “who am I.” Answer the question yourself, rather than asking others to answer it for you.

Tell me in the comments below, what are you NO LONGER willing to tolerate as you move your business forward? Let’s talk about this!

Comments

I’m done allowing myself to assume, without even thinking about it, that I can’t do things other (“more talented” “more qualified” “financially better off” “male and therefore more competent than me” oh thank you, the culture I grew up in — whatever the unconscious assumption is) people can do. I’m done letting that assumption of my own inability go unnoticed and unchallenged.

Thank you for your honesty for it helped me realize that I feel that constantly. My feelings of “I need to know more”, I’m not skilled enough, I don’t have enough experience, and the best one is I’m too old” are all statements I make when I compare myself to people that are successful doing things I would like to be doing.

AT Uplevel Live I said I was done being afraid of being seen. Since then Ive really worked on that one. A NEW one has come up though…IM DONE BEING ADDICTED TO STRUGGLE and the belief that success has to be hard. Thanks Christine.

Kelly, thank you! I am also done with thinking that struggle is necessary. I am allowing my business efforts to flow more easily and joyfully. As I enjoy my life more and make things easier and simpler (including de-cluttering now), energy opens up for people to contact ME and invite me to play music, read poems, go on TV interviews for my book, and facilitate healing. I also LET GO of giving away my services, knowing that I deserve to be paid promptly. I Am a business woman.

Mallika – And watch what happens when you start saying NO to those things. Better things will come. I say no to any potential client I can tell is going to be harsh, negative, or rude to my team. And over the years, my clients just keep getting better and better!

I’m done being a workaholic and not being financially supported in way that reflects how hard I have worked. I am done working so many hours for other people’s agendas simply to make ends meet and not thrive.

Christine — thanks for this phenomenal video. It’s so clear, so real, and so you. At the event I wrote that I’m done being invisible, hidden, and “safe.” Your comments here helped me see an even more bedrock issue. So now, I’m done with allowing myself to be ruled by my need for others’ approval and “love.” Of course I still need authentic connection with others — but I’m taking off the collar now. Thanks again for your willingness to speak to both our hearts and minds at the same time.

Great video! I’m done with being a perfectionist. I’m done with pushing myself too hard and not enjoying my life or my business. I’m done with thinking earning money is hard, and not something I’m good at. Thanks for the opp. to state our intentions, and get clear!

Hey! That’s was my I’M DONE “Fearing Being Seen” sticker! And yes, I’m done. I know pushing through this fear is what needs to happen in order for me to become the business owner I want to be. Loved the video…loved the exercise.

Thanks for this beautiful video! I’m done with “being ready” before I start! Since the event I am now FULLY BOOKED with private clients!!! As I continue to celebrate and fully feel that completion, my next one is: I’m done with feeling it’s going to be too hard and take too long. I’m already well on my way with that one, as having the experience of being fully booked is really sinking in…this is fun stuff!!!

I loved this exercise we did in Atlanta, Christine! I am SO done with giving my power away; listening to the negative voices in my head; hiding who I am, what my talents are and what I have to offer; being afraid to ask for help and trying to do everything on my own (not just in my business!); comparing myself to others; and suppressing my warrior side because “nice” girls are not like that (I’m done with the “nice” girl act!). Thanks for inspiring me to give some thought to these and to release them. Yey!

This was so perfect for me right now Christine. I’m becoming more and more confident, while noticing the opinions of others have become more frequent. It’s caused me to really find my inner strength and voice to stay on track with my heart and truth. I’m done with putting any weight to someone’s critical opinion about what I do or how I do it!

I’m done preparing, to get ready, to prepare, to begin..I’m in- and I’m starting new things NOW. I have to realize I know more than they do and that means it’s time to start sharing with the world! It’s action time.

I’m new to your community, but this video brought me right ‘in’ to the heart of what you are all working on together! I am “DONE” telling myself and others that I must continue to work in a situation where I feel so devalued! I am ready to show up more, be real about my gifts for others and to step more fully into my ‘soul work’ this time around!! (I work as a freelance teaching-artist, by the way!) Many, many thanks for the compelling video! Bravissimo!!!

At the conference, I put that I was done allowing others’ opinions of me to matter so much that I remained invisible. To further refine that though, I think that I make the assumption that I’m not yet good enough to really be successful. That there is always someone doing it better or something else that I need to learn and so I need to wait until I’m in a better place. This is a combination of the perfect and being invisible one. As though I’m always so busy comparing myself to others (and even who I assume others are) that I hold myself back from really being myself. I work on this one all the time and though other people tend to see me as successful, I feel I am always on the edge of stepping into real success.

Since coming back from the event and really sitting with my…I’m done with the mediocre in my life, that I am now ready to show up for the people that need my help with their stuck emotions and limiting beliefs. I no longer need to be a shadow chaser, always hiding from me and who I am. I want to serve people who need me to show up. How can I not I have arrived and not striving any longer ! That is a wonderful feeling right in itself.

Great topic! I am done allowing non-ideal clients to devalue my business, my skills, my team and my time by not enforcing reasonable policies on pre-payment, late arrivals, cancellations, late date changes, and no shows. As I would imagine most of you can agree, I strongly dislike and dread having to deal with those issues, and it makes me feel like Cruella Deville. However, after having the forward progression of my business delayed due to massive financial hits from no-shows and late date changes, I have decided that allowing non-ideal clients to dictate the trajectory of my business feels worse than enforcing professional policies, (or as CK once referred to it, “Training my clients how to work with me.”)

This is a great post and a way to actually express what may have been limiting my business success. For me, it’s the fact that I don’t reach out as much as I should do and targeting wrong clients. I wll henceforth let go of my attachment to my old ways of doing things and attract the right clients.

I am done with not believing I can. I know I can, I no longer feel rejection (not often anyway, LOL). I have what it takes to move forward and tackle what ever obstacles or opportunities come my way. From applying to big shows to submitting articles to art/craft magazines, I can do it. If there is a no, I just try again.

I am (at long last) ready to let go of words my sister said as we arrived at my mom’s house after my (much beloved) grandmother’s funeral: “Julie, you love being the center of attention.” After I said “No, not really,” her husband repeated, “It’s OK that you love being the center of attention.” And I repeated that um, no, it’s not about that.

I have been worrying and stressing over that conversation FOR YEARS. Seriously.

It (obviously) touched a nerve with its combination of truth (I DO like it when people listen to my stories and appreciate what I offer) and untruth (It’s never been about being the center of attention. It’s always been about love and service for me, and, in that case, it was about showing up with all of me and not holding back.) I had been trying to move out of my comfort zone to offer more to the world, and I kinda got shamed for it.

(In my German-Irish Catholic family, it is seriously not ok to be seen or to draw attention to yourself. We’re all about humility.)

So I’ve kept shaming myself and arguing in my head with my sister and basically, not doing the things I love to do or sharing the gifts I love to share because of these stupid comments she’s probably long forgotten about.

I always mean to let this little of mine shine, but the truth is that I hold back when I fear I’m taking too much attention away from others.

So I’m letting go of that story I’ve been telling myself and the struggle it created, and instead recognizing that my light lights up others because I am always sharing from a place of love. It’s the only place I know.

Thank you so much, Christine, and all the rest of the posters and participants of your events, who have inspired me and role modeled for me. Your lights are lighting me up!

I am done keeping items, beliefs and self-talk messages that I adopted simply because I never realized I could choose not to. I am ready to make choices and honor those choices, starting with Letting go!

I, as many others posted on here, so needed this today! For me in this moment, I am done with making decisions based on fear or out of desperation. No more! Even during tough times, I will move forward in the best way I can, in that moment, not allowing fear to take over.